He might have to flick 9 councilors in the eye with a pen to get Confederation Park as a stadium site for consideration and hope for ink poisoning for Chad Collins.

I am NEVER going to get sick of the Bratina pen jokes.

__________________
"Above all, Hamilton must learn to think like a city, not a suburban hybrid where residents drive everywhere. What makes Hamilton interesting is the fact it's a city. The sprawl that surrounds it, which can be found all over North America, is running out of time."

Jason Farr ran a good campaign, came off as likable and appealed to a wide audience.

I understand that.... however:

Jason Farr, in his Cable 14 'victory interview' makes the statement that "There is nobody on welfare who wants to be on welfare" after giving a line about growing up in poverty.

I already had the computer open, so I typed down the responses of the people watching the results with me. Verbatim, in order:

"What??!"
"F---"
"He really doesn't know this city."
"Are you kidding me?!"
"I want to punch him in the face."
"It's why this city doesn't go anywhere."
"I'm in shock"
"It's too bad he won"
"You can't find solutions if you don't understand the problem."
"That was stupid."
"Now he's gonna be a fixture on council just like all the other fixtures, not moving."
"Has he even, like, MET anyone from Hamilton?"
"Just walk around downtown."
"Shouldn't he be thinking this kind of crap through before he opens his mouth?"
"Right after that, to make such a statement..."
"Life sucks."

Man, I know it's all politically incorrect to imply that people misuse the system, but there's a lot - especially younger ones my age - that do. If he can't call a spade a spade... our families will continue to laugh at us through their xboxes, pizza and beerssssss.

Nope, in my living room, no alcohol tonight. Budget reasons, and thought it would be nice to have some neighbours over. (Unfortunately, ones whose family pulls the same crap as our relatives, so they also reacted strongly to Farr's statements). We've spent $1.98 on two packs of cookies and have the teakettle on. Although "angry drinks" would be a little more appropriate right now.

Truly, though, though by and large our family works hard, there are members who think we're nuts when "free money" is easy to get, especially when their friends trade hints and tricks about how to best manipulate the system and workers in it and where money can possibly come from, and all the wonderful things free legal aid can do for you in manipulating landlords and stuff. And not just one of them, either.

It makes me want to vomit, especially because when you're in your thirties and have babies, you need to grow the f*** up and support your family, not place a higher value on drinking with your buddies and having shiny toys (and still not be willing to work for it). There's other pieces to these puzzle (enabling parents and crap) but man, if my Ward 2 rep thinks those issues don't exist, come ON. He can't possibly be that stupid.

Tetley did very well for a first time running for councillor. Like I said in another post, Morellie had 75% of the vote last election, you just can't turn around that kind of momentum on a dime. Since Morelli got 44% of the vote this time around, that's still a huge turnaround to lose 31% of your support.

I also looked at the individual poll station results for ward 3 and the farther North you go in the Ward the more support Morelli had and as you go south Tetley grabbed more of the vote. In fact Tetley pretty much had the majority of the vote in South Stipely, St. Clair and Blakely he just couldn't break the iron curtain of Main Street East.

Nearly 1000 more voters this go around, and Morelli did have a clear drop in support. His base is solid here though. Knocking him out is practically an insurmountable feat. Tetley mounted a strong challenge, but he would have needed to be the sole challenger to get closer to the goal.This ward won't be up for grabs until Morelli retires.

On the Welfare comment.....while obviously Farr was over-reaching w/that one....

Its important to realize how pathetic social assistance rates are....roughly $600.00 per month for a single individual. That's all-in (though you do get medical benefits and some other odd n'sods).

Can anyone here truly imagine having to live on that? Even in Hamilton, rent at that level is hard to come by, never mind food.

Now I'm not delusional that some people on pogey aren't lazily accepting their fate.......and enjoying free accommodation w/friends or family; or separately getting subsidized housing...

Still, not much quality of life on that budget.

I think there's a balanced nuance here......

Most people on Social Assistance do want to get a job etc.

A meaningful number don't..........though

That's not strictly speaking because they love the lifestyle of welfare...(in most cases)..........

Rather its a case of the alternative being a min. wage job at $10.25 per hour, for 37.5 hours a week (the standard f/t in retail) and often with no benefits.

And if that's your alternative as un-skilled, entry-level worker, its not hard to see how some end up staying on social assistance.

Many also lack the skills to get a job (interview skills, resume etc.)

If we had either universal or low-income pharmacare and dentalcare, and these were no longer tied to receiving welfare...(allows free-contraception)

If minimum wage were just a bit higher (say $12 per hour)

If we enforce people not dropping out of high school, and made job-hunting skills part of the curriculum in grade 11.

We wouldn't get everyone off social assistance, but I bet we could get the number down by 1/2 in a hurry.

Another key is designing the system so work pays. Both by letting people save up a bit more; and by not their kids job against their welfare income (this happens now)....and helps create that multi-generational effect.